Pentagon’s Director, Operational Test & Evaluation 2018 Annual Report

February 4, 2019 7:14 PM

The following is the Office of the Director, Operational Test & Evaluation (DOT&E) 2017 annual report. It was released in late January 2019.

From the Report

The freedom and security of our nation depends on the lethality and readiness of our military. Our warfighters must be prepared for combat, equipped with secure, credible weapon systems, and trained to employ those systems effectively and decisively. As the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E), I ensure that our weapon systems are systematically tested across a range of operational conditions that warfighters are likely to encounter in combat. Establishing combat credibility through realistic testing gives warfighters the confidence their weapons and equipment will work when they need them. I have been in this position for just over one year and, during this time, have informed 92 acquisition and 25 fielding decisions for the Department. When I was appointed to this position, I committed to increasing collaboration between DOT&E and other agencies within the defense community. Looking back, I have been most impressed with the “spirit of cooperation” between OSD and the military Services. With an attitude of teamwork, we are working towards the ability to field combat credible systems at the speed of relevance.

During the past year, my office collaborated with other OSD offices and the test and evaluation (T&E) community to increase combined approaches to testing programs. We worked with the OSD Director of Developmental T&E (DT&E) and the Services’ Operational Test Agencies (OTAs) to develop streamlined guidance for Test and Evaluation Master Plans (TEMPs). We are constructing a risk assessment policy to determine the level of oversight that DOT&E will exercise for middle-tier and traditional acquisition programs. I reviewed the existing DOT&E oversight list and retained oversight of those capabilities that are most critical to our current and future national security needs. My goal in each case was to facilitate more rapid development and deployment of weapon systems without sacrificing the integrity or independence of the T&E community. Following this review, I established policy to clarify criteria to both place and remove a program on the oversight list.

Building on the work of the past year, my initiatives for this next year center on several key focus areas. Software-intensive systems and their cybersecurity implications remain a high priority. Collaborating with DT&E to conduct operational T&E (OT&E) earlier in the system development and acquisition process, adapting T&E for emergent technologies, improving our testing environments, and enhancing the workforce required to support T&E are other key focus areas.

Download the document here.

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